China Mulls Holidays for Nanjing Massacre, Japan Defeat

Visitors view the names of victims of Japanese war crimes at the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Museum in Nanjing. Photograpehr: Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images

Feb. 26 (Bloomberg) -- China is considering new national
days to mark the Nanjing Massacre and Japan’s defeat in
World War II, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

Sept. 3 may be designated a victory day and Dec. 13 a
national memorial day for victims of Nanjing, Xinhua said
yesterday, citing draft decisions by the Standing Committee of
the National People’s Congress. The actual number of Chinese
killed in the weeks after Japanese forces captured Nanjing in
1937 is in dispute. China estimates the figure at 300,000, with
some Japanese nationalists denying the massacre occurred at all.

The lawmakers’ decision may further escalate tensions with
Japan after Shinzo Abe in December became the first sitting
prime minister to visit the Yasukuni Shrine since 2006. The
Tokyo shrine honors Japan’s war-dead, including convicted World
War II criminals, and is considered a symbol of past Japanese
militarism in China and South Korea.

Sino-Japanese relations have deteriorated since Japan’s
government in September 2012 purchased islands in the East China
Sea also claimed by China. Coast guard vessels from the two
countries regularly tail each other in waters around the islands
and, in November, China established an air defense
identification zone over the islands, demanding that aircraft
file flight plans with it before entering the area.

“We are aware that there are various debates about the
facts of the Nanking incident,” Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary
Yoshihide Suga told reporters today in Tokyo, using the previous
name for Nanjing. “It can’t be denied that after the former
Imperial troops entered Nanking, civilians were killed and there
was looting.”

China’s plans to make the events are basically
a domestic matter, Suga said.

Abe’s visit to the war shrine, which came a month after
China set up the air zone, was condemned by China and South
Korea. The U.S., Japan’s ally, said it was disappointed in Abe’s
decision to go to the site. During his first time as prime
minister in 2006-2007, Abe stayed away from the shrine.